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Not for the first time. Broadband and mobile giant Virgin Media and O2 (VMO2) have called on Ofcom to weaken Net Neutrality rules so that they can offer products that prioritise business-critical apps, such as payment services, during periods of exceptionally high network demand. Apparently market traders lose an estimated £10m a year in sales as mobile network congestion causes card payments to fail at busy events.
Ofcom’s original Net Neutrality guidelines meant that service providers couldn’t easily impose excessive restrictions against internet traffic and should treat almost all of it equally (i.e. they should avoid favouring specific services, such as by blocking or slowing access to rival services). However, there were some exceptions, such as when providers needed to impose general traffic management, parental controls, court ordered blocks or certain security measures (e.g. anti-virus/spam filtering) etc.
The rules, which are widely supported by online content providers – the very services that make the internet worth visiting in the first place, have generally done a reasonable job of protecting consumers from bad practices by commercial providers.